January 2019 Administrative Update

Opportunities Through Enhancements

While renovations continue in multiple areas of the district’s buildings, the culmination of the Capital Facility Project in the athletic and physical education spaces of the high school are close to completion. During the construction process, we adopted the motto “we’re going camping”, as several of the usual amenities were unavailable to our students and staff. Over the past year and a half, while construction took place, we adapted in a variety of ways including sacrificing our home field advantage, sharing alternative locker rooms and making due with limited space.

As the dust settles and the paint dries on Phase 2 of the project, we look forward to an abundance of new and enhanced opportunities for our students and staff. Our expanded and redesigned locker rooms better meet the needs of present day athletic participants. The high school gymnasium’s dated wooden bleachers have been replaced with modern, accessible seating options. Attendees at high school gymnasium sporting events enjoy an updated environment complete with new scoreboards and an enhanced sound system. Lastly, the renovation of our swim locker rooms will begin upon conclusion of the boy’s winter swimming season and is scheduled to be complete by the fall of 2019 as our girls swim program takes the pool .

One of the more exciting portions of Phase 2 has been the transformation of our old weight room into the new High School Fitness Center. The space was expanded and enhanced to provide additional opportunities for students in physical education class as well as after school programs and athletics. A recent grant from the East Aurora Education Foundation secured the funds necessary to furnish the room with new strength training equipment. With a focus on free-weight concepts, the new equipment is designed to adapt to the fitness industries ever changing approach to training. As the new equipment arrives and a more comprehensive fitness center takes shape, we plan to use the facility as a hub for our wellness initiatives. Teen levels of stress and anxiety are at rates as high as we have seen in recent years. Providing a facility for students to better themselves both physically and mentally is instrumental in achieving our goals. Aligning with our Physical Education goal of life-long fitness, physical education classes will present students with programming opportunities that prepare them for fitness activities outside the school environment. Athletically, our teams have performed exceptionally well. Having a facility for student athletes to train both in and out of season will offer them the opportunity to enhance their athletic successes. Ultimately, offering students various programs that provide avenues for stress relief, bonding with their peers, personal goal setting, and promotion of self-esteem will prove the most important benefit of all.

We strive to enrich the experiences of all students in East Aurora. Advancements and improvements made through the Capital Facility Project have transformed our facilities to a level that matches our students’ athletic performances and will soon provide front-runner programming in the local educational community.